


Take Heart

by Calacious



Series: Guardians of Hawaii [3]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Averted danger to children, Care Bears - Freeform, Crack Treated Seriously, Eventual Smut, Fluff, M/M, Magic, Transmogrification, Trapped In A Closet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-19
Updated: 2017-04-19
Packaged: 2018-10-20 21:56:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10671552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/pseuds/Calacious
Summary: Danny looks down at his body and groans. Blue. Again. He's blue again, but he's not a Smurf. At least there's that. He is, however, a stocky little, grumpy little bear, and Steve is a bold lion with an untameable tail that seems to think its job is to keep Danny tethered to Steve's side at all times. Great. This ought to be good.





	Take Heart

**Author's Note:**

> I was chatting with Irene Claire and writing to her (in very broad terms) about an idea that I had for a crossover for "Hawaii Five-0" and "We Bare Bears," and she mentioned Care Bears. Hopefully she doesn't mind the mention of this here. I wrote that I didn't really know the Care Bears well, and that I probably wouldn't write anything with the Care Bears and then my muse latched onto the word, 'never,' and said, 'really? challenge accepted.' I found information about the characters at this website: http://www.agkidzone.com/care-bears/characters
> 
> There are slashy scenes in this, but they do not occur while the team is in bear form, and none of the characters are allowed to swear or even think mean thoughts while in bear form. There is also creative spellings of words in this, and some made up words, too.
> 
> Grover has a side story in this. It is brief. I am sorry. He did not fit in with the Care Bears, but he did fulfill a necessary role, and perhaps the muse will be so inclined to explore what happened from his point of view in a separate short story.

Danny stared down at the blue cloud on his white furred belly and the heart-shaped raindrops that accompanied it and sighed. He was a light blue in color, from the top of his rounded head to the toes stitched on his stubby feet.

"You're frowning again," Steve said.

Steve could afford to smile. He could afford to walk around tall and straight, and with a bit of pomp because he was a tawny colored lion with a red heart wearing a gold crown on his white belly patch. He was royalty.

 _More like a royal pain in the..._ Danny was unable to complete the thought in his current state as a child's toy. It was frustrating.

"That's completely unhelpful, you know. Just..." Danny sighed again and swept his paws up in the air and then crossed them over his chest. "This is all completely unhelpful."

"We just need to look on the bright side of things, Danny," Kono said, a little extra cheerfully.

She was a cotton candy pink in color and had a rainbow on her white belly patch. She was the embodiment of cheer and happiness and everything sparkly.

Danny hated it.

Chin, a light brown in color with a big red heart on his belly, offered Danny a smile, and placed a paw on Danny's blue shoulder. "Once we figure out what Lono and Maui have in mind for us, you'll be back to your cheery old self in no time."

Steve snorted, and hid a smile behind one of his massive paws. He swiped a tuft of his mane out of his face, and then blew at it when it refused to be tamed. Danny rolled his eyes at his partner's antics.

"Laugh it up, kitten," Danny grumbled. "And watch that tail of yours, that's the third time, third, Steven, that your wayward tail has wrapped itself around some part of me."

Steve cleared his throat and swiped at his tail, trying to keep it from wrapping around Danny for a fourth time. He shrugged when the tail wound itself around one of Danny's legs, the fluffy tip rubbing against Danny's fur in a way that was probably supposed to be soothing. Danny found it to be just another annoyance in what was becoming a long list of annoyances.

"Just once, I'd just like to tackle an assignment from the gods as myself," Danny said. "I thought we'd made it past the testing stage of this guardian thing."

Chin shrugged. "Maybe this isn't a test this time."

"Are you saying that the best way for us to keep Hawaii safe is as...walking, talking, colorful rhyming, singing, hugging bears?" Danny asked, throwing his paws up into the air and fisting them on his hips.

Chin nodded. "Lono and Maui..."

"Lono and Maui can..." Danny sputtered and almost choked on the words that he wanted to say, but physically couldn't, which Danny was grateful for, because Maui did not handle insults well, and he did not need to be turned into a slug or something. Being a blue bear was much more preferable to being a slug.

"Whoa, Danny, calm down. I think you're turning purple," Steve said.

He slapped Danny on the back, and his tail started to travel up Danny's stubby leg and twist around Danny's soft, ticklish belly.

"Make your tail stop, or so help me, Steven, I'll..." Danny pushed at the tail, trying to remove it from his person, but it only tightened around him. "It's a fricken boa constrictor. Make it stop."

"Relax, Danny," Kono said, her voice a cheerful jingle that jangled Danny's nerves and made him want to lash out just because it was too da...rn cheerful.

"Yes, Danny, I think that the more worked up you get, the tighter Steve's tail wraps around you. I think..." Chin said, trailing off as he walked around Steve and Danny, inspecting both of them with a critical eye.

And then smiling, almost to himself, Chin snapped his fingers. "Yes, it seems as though Steve's way of offering comfort to you in this form is through his tail. It's rather remarkable."

"Remarkable?" Danny feared that if he wasn't already blue, he'd be turning blue what with the way that Steve's tail was practically strangling him in its apparent effort to 'comfort' him.

"Remarkable or not, it needs to stop squeezing or I'll pop, and stuffing will fly everywhere."

Danny couldn't help but think of the time that, as a gingerbread man, he'd been shot, and the injury had remained with him after he'd been returned to his human form. He didn't want to think of what would be left of him if Steve's tail strangled him.

Steve's tail loosened a little, and Danny thought he could see his partner's cheeks turning a faint pink in color, but it could have been a trick of the lighting, or something in his eye, or the general craziness of their situation taking over his mind. Steve did not blush very often.

"D, I -"

"Just, I'm okay now, babe, really, your tail can..." Danny waved one of his paws in the air. "Stand down."

Steve blinked at Danny and smiled in a way that was almost blinding. He pulled Danny close into a real hug and his tail let go of Danny for a moment before wrapping itself once more around one of Danny's legs.

"Wow, boss, that was a wonderful hug," Kono praised. She clapped her hands, and hugged each of them in turn before spinning and then hopping in the air. "I don't know what it is, but I just feel so...cheerful."

Steve nodded. "I know what you mean, I feel like hugging the entire world and keeping it safe." He stood next to Danny and pulled him close with one arm, tucking Danny in beneath his mane.

Danny sighed and huffed and blew at a stray tuft of fur that landed on the top of his forehead. Steve's mane was tickling him, and his tail was still doing that annoying soothing rubbing thing.

"Can we just get this over with, whatever _this_ is, and go on with our lives, our _real_ lives as humans?" Danny asked no one in particular.

"I think I know what it is that we need to do, and why we're -"

"In the shape of characters from a children's cartoon?" Danny interrupted.

His tummy grumbled, and he closed his eyes, hoping that his cheeks had not pinked up the way that Steve's had earlier. He felt something hard press against his paw and opened his eyes to find Steve staring at him from ridiculously shiny eyes that seemed to be filled with light and love and all things sparkly and wonderful. Steve had a granola bar in his paw and his tail was creeping up Danny's leg. It really was too much love and deep concern for Danny, especially in his current form, to take.

Danny growled and tore the granola bar from Steve's paw and stuffed it in his mouth almost whole. When he choked, Steve slapped him on the back, and the tail squeezed his leg in worry until Danny stopped coughing and managed to chew and then swallow the remaining bits and pieces of the granola bar.

Kono handed Danny a glass of water, and Chin watched from his position near their smart computer, leaning against a leg of the table, tablet in hand, waiting. They were much too short to reach the computer table, and Danny wondered how Chin had managed to procure and operate the tablet that he held. The 'fingers' of his paws were thick and clunky.

Danny knew that if Chin had not been in the form of a cute, cuddly brown bear, his face would hold an _'I am not amused, are you finished choking now so we can get back to business?'_ look. One that he seemed to wear often in Danny and Steve's presence. He'd have an eyebrow raised, and his lips pursed, and his eyes would glitter with a touch of impatience. As a bear, Chin looked mildly irritated and somewhat amused, and like someone who could give a mighty fine hug if you asked him to. That, and a firm handshake, as well as good, almost grandfatherly, advice.

"Sorry," Danny said and then he burped and felt himself blushing. He handed the empty water glass back to Kono and pushed off Steve's gentle paw when the handsy lion started rubbing Danny's back.

"As I was saying," Chin said, clearing his throat. "I believe that the gods have transmogrified us into our current shapes because the individuals we are being called to save are children. A group of frightened elementary school children have somehow managed to lock themselves in a utility room and can't get out."

Danny cocked his head to the side and raised a paw. "Uh, why don't the adults just unlock the door and get the kids out?"

The solution seemed as simple as adding two plus two in Danny's mind. He might currently be in the shape of a cuddly, if _slightly_ grouchy bear, but his mind was still as sharp as a tack.

Steve frowned and took a step toward Chin and the tablet, bringing Danny along with him as Steve still had his tail wrapped around a leg, and a paw wrapped around a shoulder. It was stifling, yet Danny simply sighed rather than complain. Complaining would not lead to anything good. Not when Steve's tail seemed to have a mind of its own, and Steve seemed to be extra clingy as the embodiment of a stuffed lion.

"They did unlock the door, but the kids seemed to have barricaded themselves inside of the utility room, and some of the heavier, bulkier items shifted and got wedged up against the door. The janitor thinks it might be a ladder or one of the shelves that's making it impossible for them to get in. The door won't budge more than a couple of inches," Chin said.

He swiped at an image, enlarging it for the team to see better, revealing the tear-streaked face of a little boy peeking from the other side of the heavy-duty door. The door was stuck at maybe an inch and a half open. Another image revealed a grubby hand reaching out through the narrow opening.

"Is that blood?" Steve asked, pointing at the image of a little girl's hand.

Danny leaned over the tablet, blue heart-shaped nose nearly touching it, to get a closer look at the small, pudgy hand.

"Wait a minute, I think...is that..." Danny absentmindedly brushed Steve's tail away from his backside as he mulled over what it was that he was seeing, and then, for the first time since he was transmogrified into a blue bear, he smiled. "Yes, it's jam. Strawberry, if I'm not mistaken."

"Strawberry jam?" The incredulity was thick in Steve's voice, and Danny pressed a stubby finger into the lion's chest.

Nodding, Danny thumped Steve in the chest. "Strawberry jam."

"Are you sure it's just strawberry jam, Danny?" Kono asked, worried.

She shoved her way between her cousin and Steve and Danny and plucked the tablet away from her cousin to take a closer look at the picture and then smiled and danced a little and handed the tablet back to Chin whose mouth was stitched into a straight, unamused line.

"Danny's right, it's strawberry jam, or maybe grape jelly, the quality of the image isn't very good," Kono said.

Danny could feel her relief, and sense of joy, sweep over him, like magic, and from the way that Steve and Chin both shivered, their fur rippling, Danny knew that they'd felt it too. A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, but he maintained a frown, even when Kono cupped each of their faces in her hands, turn by turn, and kissed them on the cheek.

"I still say that it might be blood," Steve said, but he looked away when Danny glared at him. "Or strawberry jam," he muttered.

"Okay, so we know that the kids are stuck and where they're stuck. How do we know all of this, and why aren't the adults on scene going in through the ceiling or something?" Danny asked, gesturing toward the tablet in Chin's paws.

"One of the older students filmed some of it, and posted it online. It's gone viral. The nearby fire departments are busy dealing with an out of control fire and emergency personnel are helping with the victims of the fire. There are a couple of police officers on scene at the school, but they've made no headway yet," Chin explained.

"Really? And Lono and Maui think our efforts belong with those kids rather than with those who are helping out with the fire?" Danny threw his paws into the air and tried, in vain, to step away from Steve's claustrophobic grip, but the lion's tail almost tripped him, and Steve's paw was immovable.

"Danny, calm down, buddy," Steve said, stroking Danny's back.

Danny batted Steve's paws away and wrapped his arms around his chest.

"I just don't get it."

He shook his head, and felt thunderclouds roll in his thoughts. It didn't make sense. If the fire was that bad, then they should be there, helping. The adults would eventually find a way into the utility room and get the frightened kids out of it, and they'd be no worse for the wear, but people would die in the fire. He felt it in his heart and gut.

"Danny, the fire is covered. We're needed at that school with those children," Steve said in a quiet, yet majestic sounding voice.

Danny's frown deepened, and he shook his head to clear it. An image of Grace, age three, popped into his head. Gap-toothed smile, dark hair in braids, a few loose strands framing her face, and fat tears tracking their way down her reddened cheeks as she clung to him, terrified after having accidentally locking herself in her parent's closet for hours when she was supposed to be taking a nap. Danny had been at work, and Rachel had been frantic with worry when she couldn't find Grace, who had fallen asleep in the closet, and only started crying once she woke and realized she couldn't get out. He drew in a sharp breath, the terror, and relief as freshly with him in the memory as it had been on that day.

"You're right, I'm sorry," Danny said. "Those kids are frightened. They need us."

"Yes, they do," Kono said, thumping Danny on the back with surprising force and grinning like a lunatic.

"Okay, so, how exactly do we get there?" Danny asked, opening his arms wide, and looking himself, and the others, up and down, noting how the computer table seemed miles away from them at their current, much diminished, height.

"We can't drive there, and I think walking downtown like this is going to draw unwanted attention. All it takes is one kid with sticky fingers, and a love of stuffed animals, and like that, one of us is snatched up and gone." Danny snapped his fingers to emphasize how quickly they could be nabbed as walking, talking stuffed animals.

"Not to mention the people who would think they were hallucinating. We could cause mass hysteria," Kono said. Her mouth formed a perfect little 'O' and her eyes widened slightly. "We can't cause mass hysteria, Chin, we just can't."

"It's simple," Chin said, and he grinned at them. Danny detected a touch of madness, or maybe it was excitement, in Chin's glassy eyes. "We use magic."

Danny blinked at Chin, and then turned to share a frown with Steve. Kono looked overly delighted and like she might start skipping. Danny opened his mouth to deliver a scathing remark that would probably be censored, but Chin held up a paw and locked eyes with Steve.

"Magic?" Steve asked in a voice that rumbled.

"Magic," Chin repeated, nodding. "I used it earlier."

"You did, when?" Kono asked, the corners of her mouth turned slightly downward in a pout.

"How do you think I got the tablet?" Chin asked.

"How did you get the tablet?" Danny asked.

"Magic," Chin said.

Danny wanted to wipe the smirk off of Chin's face. Magic, outside of the stuff that Maui and Lono did (and Danny was of half a mind that what he was currently experiencing, and had experienced in the past was nothing but a very vivid nightmare or hallucination), did not exist. Steve's tail squeezed Danny's leg and then rubbed the back of it consolingly.

"Explain," Steve said.

His voice was definitely growly, and Danny felt himself blushing as that growliness was kind of...nice. Danny sent a silent prayer to Maui and Lono, asking that Steve be allowed to temporarily keep the growliness once they'd been returned to their rightful shapes.

 _No naughty thoughts while in the shape of a beloved children's toy_ , he chastised himself, and focused, not on Steve's proximity, or the way that his tail was almost lazily stroking Danny's lower back in an effort to comfort him, but on Chin and what he was saying.

He missed some of it, and was mildly alarmed when Steve gathered Danny closer still, and they all drew close, pressing their heads together, and wrapping their arms around each other in a huddle. He'd apparently missed _all_ of what Chin had said when he'd gone off on his tangential thought. _Oops._

Frowning, Danny opened his mouth to ask what it was they were doing, but his breath was stolen from him, a bright, rainbow colored light exploded around them, raining sprinkles down on them, and suddenly Danny felt as though he had no body. He was floating, traveling at breakneck speeds along an honest to god rainbow. It was slippy and slidey, and altogether much too dizzying and stomach-upsetting, and Danny was thankful for Steve, the lion's, clinginess because it was the only thing grounding him as they hurtled through space on the arch of a sparkly rainbow.

The ride ended as abruptly as it began, and Danny lost his footing, but Steve caught him, and he shook the lion loose, fur bristling with embarrassment and a mild amount of panic as he realized that, not only had they magically traveled on a rainbow, but they'd been deposited in the dark utility closet. There were half a dozen pairs of eyes staring at the four of them, jaws dropped in shock and wonder before mouths were closed and the children they'd been sent to save smiled widely.

Tears were dried, and one little kid, he couldn't have been more than three or four years old, reached for Danny and pulled him close to his chest. He squeezed Danny so tightly that Danny couldn't breathe. Steve's tail was still wrapped around Danny's leg, and it pulled at Danny even as the little boy squeezed the stuffing out of him, sobbing into Danny's fur, covering him with snot and tears.

"You came, you really came," the little boy sobbed, breath shuddering in his chest.

Danny awkwardly tried patting the little boy's back, but could only reach his arm. "Yes," he managed to eke out the word between one heaved breath and the next. "I...we came."

"Hey, it's okay now, we're here to help you," Steve, ever in charge, even as a stuffed animal, said, and the little boy stopped breathing.

Danny could hear the little boy's heart beating out a frenzied tattoo in his chest, he could feel it through the boy's thin shirt where he was pressed up against the boy. Danny placed a paw between himself and the boy and pushed, breathing a little easier when the boy started breathing, and loosened his hold, just a little, on Danny.

"You can talk," the little boy, Dillon, (the name popped into Danny's head, dare he think it, magically) said in awe.

Steve nodded, and placed a paw on the little boy's knee. It was then that Danny realized just how small they really were. They were child-sized, just the right size to hold tight at night, or hold on a lap, or wiggle through a small gap in the door, though Danny doubted that was what Lono and Maui had sent them to do. They were here to comfort, and console, and to help these children get out of the utility closet using, apparently, magic.

Steve chuckled, and smiled up at the little boy. "Yes, we can talk, and we're here to help you and your friends."

"Really?" a little girl with dark hair and a flower printed dress asked. She had a thumb planted in her mouth, and was petting a smiling Kono who was sitting on her lap.

Chin was sitting on the shoulder of another little boy whose face was covered in freckles. The boy was wearing a thick pair of glasses that screamed, nerd, even at such a young age, but he was smiling as he bore Chin proudly on his shoulder, a dimple gracing one of his cheeks.

The other three children's eyes glittered in the dim light that came through the crack in the door as they inched closer to the talking 'toys' and their friends.

"Are you really real?" another little girl asked. She had an adorable lisp, and reached out to touch Danny's back. She giggled when Danny wriggled around, Dillon's hold now loose enough to give him the wiggle room, so that he could face her.

Danny nodded seriously, and reached out a paw to the little girl who took it and held on as though Danny was a lifeline. "Yes, we're really real, and we're here to help you."

"But, how can you help us? You're just a bunch of toys that can talk," one little boy asked. He scooted out of the dark corner and into the light, his mouth was twisted into a dark frown. He had a smattering of freckles across his nose, and hair the color of muddy water.

"What can you do?"

"What can we do?" Danny asked, incredulous, waving his arms. "What can we do? I'll tell you what we can do, we can move that ladder over there and get you out of here, that's what we can do."

"But, you're just toys," the little boy countered, lips twisting downward and eyes narrowing. "You're so small, and, and..."

Danny shook his head and chopped one of his paws through the air. "It isn't size that matters," he said, ignoring Steve's snort. "It's heart. We have heart, and strength, and -"

"Magic!" Kono exclaimed, bouncing on the little girl's lap. "We have magic, right boss?"

Steve nodded seriously, his tail twitching now that it was no longer wrapped around Danny's leg. The last child, a little girl who'd wedged herself into a corner of the room was eyeing Steve like he was a piece of particularly delicious candy that she wanted to get hold of. Steve was doing his best to keep some distance between himself and the little girl in an attempt to remain out of her reach. She was the girl who had strawberry jam on her hand, and Danny almost laughed at the thought of Steve getting strawberry jam stuck in his fluffy mane.

The skeptical boy scowled at Kono and Steve, and Danny wriggled free from the boy who'd smothered him so that the could walk over to the boy who was scowling at them. Clearly the kid had trust issues, and if Danny was reading the situation right, he'd been told, probably by many adults, maybe some older siblings and bigger students, that he was too little to do a great deal many things. Much as he didn't want to admit it, Danny could relate.

He tapped the boy's foot, and when the boy just scowled harder, and jutted his chin out in stubborn defiance, Danny sighed, and started climbing into the boy's lap. He sat on the boy's knees and positioned himself so that he could look into the boy's eyes. He'd always appreciated it when adults talked to him like he mattered, and looked him in the eye.

In the midst of the skepticism mirrored in the little boy's eyes, Danny could see fear, and a tiny bit of hope. He latched onto the boy's hope, and offered him a slight smile. It felt much more natural for him to scowl and frown in this shape, and Danny could see that the kid was more used to frowning as well. He was dealing with a smart kid. One who did not believe everything he was told, but who questioned everything, incessantly, until he found out the truth and could be certain of it.

"I didn't believe in magic either," Danny said whisper soft so that only the kid could hear him. "But then I traveled here on a rainbow. And to be honest, these guys are all too happy, touchy feely, for me, but they _are_ good, and they mean well. You can trust them. You can trust me."

"I tried to move the ladder," the little boy, Max (the name etched itself across Danny's mind), said. "But, it was too big, and I'm just too small. I'm not big enough to do anything right."

Max was close to tears, and Danny knew that if one of the kids, especially the strong one, started crying, they all would. He did not want to be locked in a room, even for a short amount of time, with six wailing kids.

"One day you _will_ be," Danny said. "And don't let anyone tell you differently. You might not be able to move that ladder now, but one day, you will be big and strong enough to move any ladder that gets in your way." Danny hoped the metaphor wasn't lost on the little kid, that, one day, he'd remember back to this moment and understand what Danny was really trying to tell him.

"I want to be strong and big enough now," Max said. His lower lip trembled. "It was my fault that the ladder fell," he confessed, and he hugged Danny close.

"Hey, hey, it's okay," Danny said, patting Max's arm. "It's okay. You didn't mean to make the ladder fall, did you?"

Max shook his head. "No, I didn't. I was just trying to get the ball from the top shelf so that maybe the big kids would let us play with them, but it fell, and then everything fell, and we got stuck, and now we can't get out, and I want my mommy."

"Shh, it's okay, Max," Danny said.

The little boy gasped and moved back so he could look Danny in the eye. "How did you know my name?"

"Magic," Danny said.

"Do you know all of our names?" the little girl with the thumb in her mouth asked, and her name, Mariko, popped into Danny's head.

Danny looked at each kid in turn, and each of their names popped into his head. Kono's delighted laugh and clap relieved Danny, because he'd feared that the children's names were only coming to him.

"I do," Danny said, and pointing at each child in turn, he stated their names, "Dillon, Mariko, Peter, Leilani, and..." Danny winked at the little girl with the strawberry jam as she reached out to grab Steve, "Jordan."

"Hey," Steve exclaimed as he was lifted into the air and hugged tightly against the little girl's chest.

"Don't mind him," Danny said, giggling. "He's just a sour puss."

"Very funny, D," Steve said, voice muffled by the little girl's shirt.

"So, how _are_ we gonna get out of here?" Peter asked. He pushed his glasses on his nose and turned his head to look at Chin who was still sitting on Peter's shoulder.

"Like my blue friend over there said." Chin gestured in Danny's direction. "We're going to use magic, but, and this is very, very important..."

The children leaned in closer to Chin, eyes wide, breath held, lips clenched in teeth, their attention rapt.

"In order for our magic to work, we all have to believe that it will work, okay?"

As one, the children, even Max, nodded. Danny rolled his eyes, and crossed his arms over his chest. Kono's eyes lit up, and Steve's tail twitched.

"That's it?" Peter and Max asked.

"We just have to believe that it will work and it will?" Max rubbed a the soft fur of Danny's paw between his thumb and pointer finger.

"All it takes is a little faith," Kono said. "Just a little."

"But magic's not real," Jordan said, turning Steve around to look into his face as though she could see the truth in his face. "My mama said it wasn't. It's just in books, an' movies."

"Would we be here if it wasn't real?" Steve asked. "Could I talk if magic wasn't real?"

The little girl's brow wrinkled in thought, and then she returned Steve's smile with one that showed off her missing front teeth. "It _is_ real. Magic's real."

"And there's one more thing," Kono said, holding her paw up when Chin opened his mouth. "When this is over, you can't tell anyone that we were here."

"But, why?" Mariko asked.

"Because, no one's gonna believe that we were saved by magic and talking toys," Dillon said, rolling his eyes. "I didn't really think it would happen...but it did."

"What didn't you think would happen?" Danny asked.

"I didn't think that asking you guys to come would work," Dillon said. "But it did. It really did."

"Yes, kid, it did," Danny said.

"Alright," Chin said, interrupting what would not doubt have been a fresh round of questions. "I'm going to count to three, and when I do, we all need to repeat the words, 'Magic, magic in my heart, magic, magic, do your part,' and clap our hands. And remember, you have to believe."

Danny shook his head, and scowled at the look that Chin gave him. It was clear that Chin was silently communicating to him that, not only would he repeat those ridiculous words, but he'd do so with enthusiasm.

 _As if,_ Danny thought, but when the time came for him to say the silly words, and clap, he did, and watched, in almost as much awe as the kids, as the ladder shook, and moved away from the door. To the amazement of everyone, the coveted ball fell from the top of the shelf into Max's arms, and Danny quickly scuttled off of the boy's lap lest he be crushed in the boy's enthusiasm to claim the ball for his own.

"Wow," Dillon's exclamation was echoed by Mariko, Jordan, and Leilani.

Chin clambered down from Peter's shoulder, Kono jumped from Mariko's lap, and Steve did some complicated somersault from Jordan's arms that had her giggling and clapping.

"Remember, we were never here," Steve said, and he gave the children a dashing wink and smile.

Kono hugged each child in turn, and Chin shook each one's hand. Danny allowed each child to hug him, and then he joined the rest of the team in the back of the utility closet as the door flew open, and the concerned adults smothered the children with hugs, lighthearted reprimands, and talk of miracles.

Max squared himself up to his full height, which Danny estimated to be about three feet tall, and hugged the ball proudly to himself. He turned toward the back of the closet as he was ushered out of it and smiled. Though he knew Max couldn't see it, Danny smiled too.

"So...that was..."

"Different."

"Fun."

"Satisfying."

"Yeah," Danny said, hugging his friends close.

This time it felt as though he'd been swallowed by a rainbow, and then spit out backwards and inside out. He was dizzy, and disoriented.

"Does anyone else feel like that rainbow kicked our asses?" Danny asked, and he broke out into a wide grin. "Halle-fucking-lujah, I can talk like an adult again."

Steve laughed, the sound of it tickling Danny's ear. They had landed on top of each other, and Danny struggled to work himself free. Failing, Danny succumbed, and stopped fighting. He laid right where he'd fallen, sprawled atop Steve who had his leg wrapped around Danny's left calf, and his arms wrapped around Danny's back, hugging him close.

"I give up," Danny said with a sigh, kissing Steve. "Even without a tail, you still manage to cling to me like some kind of touch deprived octopus."

Laughing at Steve's pout, Danny ran his fingers through Steve's hair, and brought an index finger to Steve's mouth. "Open," he said.

A questioning look on his face, Steve complied, sucking Danny's finger into his mouth, and then grimacing.

"What flavor would you call that?" Danny asked.

"Umm...strawberry?" Steve asked around Danny's finger.

"Strawberry jam, Steven, I told you it was strawberry jam," Danny said, smirking.

"Danny," Steve said in a growly voice, and Danny thanked the gods.

"Yes, Steven?"

"Shut up, and kiss me."

And that's exactly what Danny did, until Chin and Kono cleared their throats, reminding them that they were, in fact, in the middle of the Five-0 offices and that they should probably wait to kiss the socks (not to mention clothes) off of each other when they were home, and not in a public place.

* * *

"So, Uncle, what do you think?" Maui asked, looking at the older god out of the corner of his eye, worried about his judgement.

He'd made mistakes before, and was still smarting from some of them. Lono had spoken up for him, had stuck by him as the chosen champion for the mortals, for Hawaii, and Maui did not wish to disappoint him, or the others, but mostly, he didn't want Lono to think less of him.

Though he'd promised not to give the guardians he'd chosen for Hawaii any more tests, or put them through unnecessary trials, or make hasty decisions in anger about what shape he'd give them, he had not promised that he wouldn't make things a little fun for himself. Being a demigod did get boring from time to time. Lono understood that. At least Maui thought he did.

Lono clapped him on the shoulder and pulled Maui into a one-armed hug. Kissing the younger god on the cheek, and then the temple, he nodded in approval. "Your Guardians did well. You did well."

Smiling at the praise, Maui straightened to his full height, which was far shorter than Lono's considerable height, and he waved his hand toward the looking glass. In it, they watched the tail end of Steve and Danny's kiss, and then Maui waved his hand over the glass, revealing the children that he'd sent the guardians to save.

Little Dillon's prayer had appealed to him, and though it wasn't a prayer sent up to him, but rather to the cartoon animals that the boy loved, Maui had heard the prayer because of the purity of the prayer, and of the little boy's heart. He had faith. Maui wanted to honor that, so he had.

Other gods might consider what he'd done to be foolish, but Maui knew that saving Dillon and the other children in the way that he had would have a lasting impact on them. Danny's words to Max would be particularly important.

He knew that, in the future, Dillon, Max, Peter, Mariko, Jordan, and Leilani would play an integral part in helping to hold the encroaching darkness at bay. One day, in the not too distant future, the six friends would stand against the darkness and keep it from gaining a foothold in Hawaii.

"Why didn't you send Grover on this errand as well? Did you not accept him as a worthy guardian?" Lono asked. His hand rested on the small of Maui's back, a comforting, supportive weight.

"He was where he needed to be," Maui answered.

"Ah," Lono said, nodding as Maui waved his hand over the looking glass and the scene changed.

Grover was standing in the middle of a dwindling fire, his appearance changed dramatically. He bore black-green wings of leather, a long tail and talons. Though he stood in the middle of the great fire, the flames were not touching him, because he was eating the flames.

Grover was invisible to those who watched in open-mouthed wonder, as he swallowed the flames that surrounded him, beating down a fire that, had Maui not intervened, would have left thousands homeless, and destroyed almost all of Waikiki. Left to follow its natural route, the out of control fire would have reached the children's school, and they would have been lost to the fire, too. The darkness would have a obtained a great victory.

When Grover was finished, the fire was nothing more than a few smoldering piles of rubble that the emergency personnel and firefighters could handle on their own. Grover would need rest, and Maui had designed his particular ability to enable him that rest. As a fire eating dragon, invisible to the naked eye, Grover was able to fly away, and Maui carried him to his home on the wind, transforming him back into his fragile human form before his head hit the pillow that he shared with his wife.

The darkness had made its first move, and, though Maui had stepped up to the plate and had won that first battle, he'd had to split up his guardians to do so, and the win hadn't been complete. Dozens of people had lost their lives, and hundreds were left homeless. Waikiki had suffered a devastating blow.

Maui's eyes flashed golden fire, and Lono took his hand. "The darkness is just toying with us now. Hold fast. You will beat it."

"And if I don't?" Maui hated the smallness of his voice, the way that his hand shook in Lono's.

"Then Hawaii is lost, and soon other lands will follow," Lono said.

"But," Lono raised Maui's hand to his lips, and kissed the palm, sending little sparks of delight dancing up and down Maui's spine, "you, will not lose to this darkness."

Hoping that Lono's trust and faith in him had not been misplaced, Maui swallowed hard, and offered his companion a smile.

"Have faith in yourself, and those you have chosen," Lono said, brushing his lips across Maui's knuckles, making the younger god shiver.

"Yes, Uncle."

There was nothing left but faith. Nothing for Maui to do but to watch, and send his guardians into the fray, and trust that he'd made the right choices.

"How long will you let McGarrett keep the gruff voice that Williams prayed for?" Lono asked, raising an eyebrow as Maui changed the scene in the looking glass.

McGarrett and Williams were home now, tangled up in sweaty limbs and mussed bed sheets. McGarrett was whispering something into Williams' ear, and Lono could see that whatever he'd said had a very potent effect on the man as the sheets tented, and Williams shivered.

"For a little while longer," Maui said. "Through the night at least. If I let him keep it longer than that, I doubt the two would get much work done, and I think that Chin and Kono would find a way to the heavens to have a word with me."

Lono chuckled, and cupped the back of Maui's neck, kissing him on the cheek.

Humming in approval of what he was seeing, Maui traced the couple, caught up in the throes of love, with an index finger. Reluctantly, and only because Lono was kissing his ear, and promising him something better than a peep show, Lono waved his hand over the image, watched it shimmer, and then dim as he turned off the looking glass. He followed Lono out of the viewing room, and into the room that they shared, feeling only a touch of guilt that he could not watch over Hawaii without rest.

Rest, as he'd learned, was necessary. Without it, he made costly mistakes. Mistakes that he could not afford to make now that the darkness had made its first bold move. It wanted the islands. Maui refused to give the darkness what it wanted.

"Come, love, it is time for rest," Lono said, kissing Maui's eyelids, and his lips. Lying beside him, Lono held Maui in his arms, and together, they slept the sleep of the gods.

 


End file.
